Chapter 10: Stephen

It is always sad when the perfect moment has to end. It is even sadder when the perfect moment almost seems to blend in to one of the longest and worst days of my life. How do people say TGIF when Friday became the worst day in my young life (so far)?

It didn't start off badly. In fact, it started off pretty well. I woke up and began to play my guitar, as I have been doing many mornings recently. It starts off the day well. Anyways, aware of Sacha sleeping on an air mattress on my floor (that is where she always sleeps, the mattress is nearly permanently blown-up in the closet across from my room) of my room, I moved to the guest room that is right beside my own. With luck, it wouldn't wake Sacha up.

Soon after I started, Elizabeth knocked on the doorframe and walked into the room smiling.

"I didn't know you played" she looked down at the guitar questioningly. Quickly I looked to the room where Sacha was sleeping, hoping that she hadn't woken up. "She's sleeping like a log," Elizabeth informed me, to my relief, "The door's still open, but she is dead to the world" she smiled and laughed.

I laughed along with her. "She usually does. Nothing can wake her, and I figured I would be safe in here. But I still worry…" I realized I sounded like I cared too much about her, so, from reflex, I added, "I mean, I guess she needs her beauty sleep. I wouldn't know. Whatever, right?" here I realized that I sounded like an idiot, so I changed the subject. "Not many people do know," I replied to her earlier question. I had stopped playing for the time that she had been talking.

"Does Sacha know that you play?" she asked me, smiling as if she had her own little inside joke. I told her that she didn't. "Well, if I'm correct," she smiled to herself a little wider before continuing, "it would be" she paused, obviously trying to pick the right words, "beneficial that you showed her. You're really good, you know" she tacked on at the end.

"Thanks, Elizabeth" Then I looked down, thinking. Should I show her the song? Why not? I decided. "I wrote a song. Would you like to hear it?"

She sat down next to me on the bed, "I would love to." Her smile was apparent through her words.

Then I played it. Some of the lyrics went a little like this:

"How don't you know that I

Memorize the way you are

The way you sing, when I play guitar

You're a fallen angel come to rest, oh, I'm so blessed

Who would've guessed that I'd be so obsessed?

Girl, you're out of this world

You're my shining star

How did I let this get so far?

You've put me under a magic spell

And you can't even tell . . ."

She was nodding her head the whole time. It is always a safe thing to do when someone is playing, especially if you don't know the song. When I looked up, she looked down quickly, avoiding my eyes. I could see that she was blinking quickly, just like you do when you are trying to blink away tears. When she thought I wasn't looking she wiped her eyes quickly.

"That was really sweet," she told me, still looking down. "It would be a great song on the radio. I think tha-that" she cleared her voice before starting over, "I think that a whole bunch of people feel like that at one time or another, I remember feeling the same way around your age" she smiled at the memory of childhood. "But I don't think my experience was the same as yours" she added, under her breath, probably not meaning for me to hear. Then she looked alarmed, as if she was surprised that she said that out loud. Then she laughed nervously and made some lame excuse that even I could see through before walking out quickly, wiping her eyes again when she thought I wasn't looking.

Not too long after that, Sacha woke up. I was still playing, now also singing along. The song I was playing when she woke up was "Gravity" by John Mayer. My eyes were closed, and the way that I found out that she was up was when she was harmonizing with me. I stopped immediately from surprise at another person in the room.

"Sorry to wake you" I said to her, even though I knew that I hadn't been the one to awaken her.

"Don't worry about it. I don't think you did, anyways. Whoa. You're really good, ya know. How did you learn to play like that? When? Why didn't I know about this? Where did you get that guitar. . ." she bombarded me with too many questions to answer all at once, so I just replied to what I expected her to ask.

"I bought this guitar at the pawn shop that's on the way home from school." I saw her shudder unintentionally and I knew she was thinking of the creepy cat lady that lived behind the building.

"I looked up the chords online, and thanks. I'm really not that good. I mean, it's really not as hard as everyone says it is".

Sacha replied forcefully, "Yes, you are that good" I felt my face turn red as it always did when someone complemented me, "It seems to come naturally to you" then she smiled a dazzling smile that left me breathless.

Not knowing what else to do, I looked down at the guitar and began to strum one of the many songs that I had looked up off of the Intranet. She was right, it did seem natural to be playing the contraption I held in my hands, and my fingers always found the right place to go once I knew the chords. Once I had recognized the song (it was "Free Fallin'" by Tom Petty), I looked back up at Sacha, who was sitting on the floor in front of me in her long pajama and a tank top. She looked amazing, even in her p.j.'s. I knew that she would never find a guy good enough for her.

She sat on the carpet in front of me, and I remembered something that I had left in my desk. As quickly as I dared, I shuffled through my desk drawers to find the creased and ink-splattered page of binder paper that I had spent so many hours working over, trying to get the words right.

"It's a song. I wrote it myself" Then I handed Sacha the sheet of paper so that she could look it over. The song was about a boy who has known a girl for so long and loved her for as long as he can remember, but the girl doesn't know. How does Sacha not know out that she is that girl in the song? Sometimes I wonder to myself if she really doesn't know or if she does know and pretends/tries not to.

After reading the song, she told me that I must be a prodigy child or genius. I told her it was the same thing, and after a moment she told me then that I must be both. She can be so blonde sometimes; I love her for it.

Then she looked at me with a dopey smile that she knows always makes me laugh. I can't help but smile at her silent beauty. As we walked down the hall towards the kitchen, she sang the whole time in her angelic voice. I have told her before that she has an amazing voice, but she always denies it. She is so modest. It was cute for a while, but it sometimes gets annoying. She can never take a compliment.

For breakfast, I made fresh waffles on the waffle maker and Sacha cut up some fruit for fruit salad. It is an automatic routine for us; we do the same thing every time we are over at my house. We work together so well, and I know that it is all to do with the fact that we know each other so well.

Breakfast went well, as it usually does at either of our houses. At mine, it is normally pretty quiet because my mom and dad are gone at work and Charlie hasn't been home for a while. At her house, if we were to eat at the kitchen table, it would be crazy and hectic, usually with Stephie and/or Ryan screaming, and if not Laurel is just sitting there, watching. It's kinda creepy, how calm Laurel always is. She never cries and has these big, watching turquoise eyes that she just looks around with. She has more tolerance of anything than any other two-year-old. I'm betting that she will become an artist when she grows up. Or, at least, something like that. But we normally don't eat at the kitchen table, anyways, we always go outside to the neglected playhouse in the backyard. It is old and creaks when we climb up it, but we not only know that it's safe, but we also know that it's the only place we even have a chance of it being even remotely quiet(er), forget peaceful. We always have cereal, or whatever ends up being in the house at the time.

The playhouse is old and creaky. It is actually more of a playground, because it used to have swings and a slide hanging off of it, but we took off those parts of it and constructed it into a play-fort. We took the slide and hammered it on top of the monkey bars, and then we hammered a tarp to the top of that, so now it's dry when it rains, and we put old carpet on the ground so that we don't have to wear shoes. We put plywood hanging out from the monkey bars so that it's a larger area, so it's a pretty large area. It has our friend's names and their crushes' names written and crossed out (I refused to take part in this) in the stained wood that supports the monkey bars. It had parts of it where Sacha, Jessica, and Amber were convinced that they were going to paint the whole thing with nail polish. They each chose a different color, so it has spots of blue, orange, and most of all, pink. This has happened a few times, but they usually end up just painting each other's nails with different colors and patterns. I will never understand.

Today, while we were eating, Charlie and Elizabeth came walked in.

"Do you remember that day after science class? It was sunny, the day of our frog lab. Was it May . . ." I heard Elizabeth say from down the hall.

Charlie laughed. "15th, and how could I forget? You walked up to me in the hall and asked me if I wanted to go out with you. You were wearing a purple polka-dotted shirt and cutoff blue jeans. You were my best friend before that, and I was just scared to make a move. I'm so glad you did. That was one of the best days of my life."

Elizabeth laughed, and you could hear the smile in her voice. She kissed Charlie lightly on the cheek, and then looked at us almost guiltily. She was so happy. "Hey, kids!"

I had made extra waffles, and put them in the refrigerator so that they could be eaten later that day. I told Elizabeth and being finished with they both sat down with full plates. Sacha and I had been talking, but once Elizabeth sat down, she began talking very quickly, "And the whole time Laurel was just staring! It was weird, but whatever, you know, it . . . it doesn't even matter. Whatever . . ." Then she looked down and didn't talk for about two minutes, then, before she was even close to finishing her second waffle, she quickly excused herself. The whole time she refused to make eye contact with anybody, and I could tell that she was avoiding Elizabeth.

She stormed off to my room, and I excused myself politely and followed her there. She was packing up her small bag over and over again. She would stuff her clothes into the bag, then take them out again before she stuffed them back in. This happened about five times while I stood at the door, then I came beside her and grabbed her arms.

"It . . . It's just not fair" she pulled her arms out of my hands and wiped her face. She was beginning to sob. "I can . . . I will never . . . Why . . . not . . ." she covered her face. It was hard to understand what she was saying.

I grabbed her wrists and pulled her arms away from her wet face. Her big, green-brown eyes were wide as she tried to calm her tears. I pushed her shoulder-length brown hair out of her face and pulled her towards me into a hug. "Shhhhh . . . It'll be okay" I thought of what must've upset her and realized that it must be partially that Charlie is moving away and partially that she felt that she would never would have a chance with Dylan. "I'll help you. Today." I whispered into her ear. That was probably the toughest promise that I have ever had to make, and when I said those words, it seemed like a part of me was being chipped away.

She lifted her head off of my shoulder and spoke in a voice that was rough from her crying fit, "Thank you. So much. Just . . . Thanks." Then she laid her head back onto my shoulder. It was like the song Happy Ending by Mika says, "Oh, a little bit of heaven, and a little bit of hell".

Just as I was thinking this, she then looked up and wiped her eyes again. "Oh, shoot! My makeup must be going crazy!"

Sure enough, there was eye makeup running down her face in lines of where her tears had run. When did she have time to put that on? She trained her face down to the floor and ran to the bathroom.

When she came back, she had cleaned her face off. There were no more tear streaks, and I saw that she had applied makeup again. She only had a small amount of it lining her eyes and some that made her lashes darker.

She saw me looking. "It's called mascara" she told me, laughing. I just nodded and tried to look uninterested. I respected that she used so little, when lots of girls at school caked the makeup onto their faces. It's quite disgusting. Lots of girls wear way too much makeup, thinking that it's attractive. It makes it seem like they have something to hide.

Sacha looked at me and smiled, "So, will you follow through with your word?"

I looked at her almost disbelievingly and told her that of course I would, and "have I ever let you down?"

"No, never. Then let's go to the beach today." She was visibly excited. "Lemme change for that, then we can go to the beach" She started mumbling, while nearly running to the bathroom to grab her toothpaste.

She gave me a hug as soon as she got back to my room, bid me goodbye, and left. I felt sad that I had made a promise that would dig myself a hole so deep.

Then I got dressed into my swimsuit, grabbed a towel, and waited for Sacha on my front porch.

She met me at my porch soon after that. "I called Jessica; she's coming later in the day. Amber wouldn't answer the phone, and Taylor is stuck shopping with her mom." She accented the word mom, not trying to hide her disgust. She fakes disgust, but I know that she's really jealous of Taylor that her mom will take her shopping. She feels like her mom never does anything with her because of the triplets, but she forgets that her mom funds her shopping trips she drags me along.

I draped my towel over my arm and we walked down to the beach. She chattered on about nothingness, and I added my two-cents where they were necessary so it looked like I was interested, but it was all I could do not to marvel at her beauty. She wore a tube-top dress that she wore for pool parties and such that she got in Mexico on a trip. Underneath that was a rainbow striped bikini that she often wore, I knew that it made her feel confident. And rightly so, too; she looked awesome in it. But she could wear a strait jacket and sweat pants stuffed with cotton and I would still think she was beautiful. That's because it's not her looks that I love (though I definitely love that, too), but it's her laid-back, easy personality.

Once we were at the beach, Sacha immediately looked over to the lifeguard stand, subconsciously turning her charm bracelet around her wrist. She saw that Dylan wasn't there and sighed softly. She looked deflated, so I grabbed her towel from her bag and laid it upon the sand, whispering to her "He'll be here. Don't worry". She looked at me as if she were desperately wishing I was right, but not believing it herself. Then she sat down and took out her journal that she always wrote in during her free time. It was nearly filled with her girly, bubbly writing in a variety of sparkly gel pens. She always seemed to be writing in it, but I'm not sure what it says. What I wouldn't give to read just a day of her journal. I would like to see just a day in her life. I would memorize every dot above the "i's" and every carefully drawn heart in the margins.

The charm bracelet on her left wrist rattled reassuringly with word she wrote. I looked over to what she was writing, and saw that she was drawing. I looked like it said "I 3 Dylan". Then I looked away, saddened by what I had just seen. She had made it very intricate and pretty, the way it danced across the page, surrounded by hearts.

Sacha brushed her hair out of her eyes with her hand and looked over at me, then pointedly over at the lifeguard stand. I looked over too, and saw that Dylan up there and was surrounded by a flock of girls that were smiling flirtatiously and flipping their hair. I hear the sharp snap! of Sacha's notebook slam shut. She kept her eyes down, avoiding my gaze, but I knew exactly what she was thinking.

I tapped her bare shoulder and she took a deep breath, still staring at her shoes at the end of her towel for a moment before looking up at me, completely clear expression. It was her mask when she was hiding what she was feeling, but I could see right through it.

"Don't worry" I told her, and when I was about to say something else, I saw her blink hard twice. I knew she was trying to hold back tears. I patted her shoulder and she sighed again before opening her notebook and doodling again.

I lay down on my towel and tried to sleep for a little bit, my thoughts troubled and sad that although I could see through Sacha's mask as plain as day, she could never see through mine. But that was so Sacha. She could never read emotions well or ever sensed that anything might be wrong or off. She lives in "ignorant bliss" as the saying says. She lives in her own perfect world, not knowing that her life isn't seamless, that other people may not always say what they mean.

I hate that I am the face of that I thought for a moment, recalling this morning when I said that I would be happy to help her ask her crush on a date when I have totally fallen for her. I wasn't really happy. And what guy would be? No person, big or small, young or old, would be happy for that. I tried to think of myself as helping Sacha by not telling her that she is the light of my day and the reason I get up in the morning, but I really know it's merely just my selfishness and fear of rejection.

I turned over to the other side, deep in thought. Oh, well. Sacha will like who she likes, and if I'm not that person, then I can't do anything to change her mind . . . I heard Sacha close her notebook and sit up on her towel. I turned to her. Her face was lit up, excited. I knew exactly what was running through her mind.

"Let's go" I said, then faked a smile. I hated that Sacha bought it.

Sacha and I began to walk over to the lifeguard stand, and twice she looked over at me, alarmed. I put my hand on her back and kept her walking. I knew it was the only way that we were going to get it over with.

Then we were over there and she was talking. She was asking him to the movies. I had to help her some, because she was so nervous. I hated the entire experience. I tried to look at an upside to it, but all of the ones that I've come up with are pathetic. Try "I got to hang out with Sacha" or "I get to go to the movies with Sacha". Then you tack on "while she asked out the guy she likes on a date" and "with her crush on a date", and you see why there really was no upside to this experience. Unless you want to count that it made Sacha happy. That is really what my goal is, in the end, because I know I won't be able to reach any other goals; so I just don't set them.

After that, I went home, and so did Sacha. Jessica didn't show up in the end, and she had sent Sacha and me a text saying that she wouldn't be able to make it. This was fine.

I went home and pulled out my guitar immediately and began playing loudly. After a while Charlie came to the door. "Rough day, little man?" he asked me, using the nickname he had used for me when I was a little kid.

I nodded and smiled a sad smile. I opened my mouth to talk, but Charlie beat me to it.

"Sacha" I nodded again and looked into his wise face, searching for advice. He read my expression and smiled at me, speaking vaguely. "Don't give up. Never, ever, give up. If she's worth it, then you're strong enough. You're a brother of mine and I know that if you are anything like me, you really know how to choose `em." He smiled again, but was still dead serious when he said "If you've been chasing after her for this long, then she's worth it." He turned and headed out of my room to the call of Elizabeth's voice. As he left, I thought I heard him mumble, "That girl had better be worth it . . ."